This week John Blankenship began excavating and grading the Rock Island Trail through Gerald. The trail is the centerpiece of Missouri’s newest state park.

Originally, plans were that city crews would do the excavation of the trail and then lay down rock. Instead Blankenship was hired to finish the job. He will be paid with funds donated to the city by an anonymous donor through Friends of the Rock Island Trail.

City workers may still provide some help in moving the rock, currently stockpiled in the center of town, to where it is needed on the trail.

Plans are to eventually extend the trail from Windsor, in western Missouri to Beaufort. In the future, the trail could extend further east to Union, then through Washington, and finally north to meet the popular Katy Trail. This would make it the longest bicycle trail in the country and possibly the world.

The mile through Gerald will be the first to be completed in this ambitious project. An opening date for Gerald’s mile has not yet been set.